Ebola outbreak declared in Congo

The government of the Democratic Republic of Congo declared an outbreak of Ebola hemorrhagic fever, a rare and deadly disease, on Tuesday, the World Health Organization reported.

The declaration came after laboratory results confirmed two cases of the disease in the province of Bikoro in the northwestern part of the country.

Ebola is endemic to the Democratic Republic of Congo, and this is its ninth outbreak of Ebola virus disease since the discovery of the virus in the country in 1976. The last outbreak occurred there in 2017 in the northern Bas Uele province. That outbreak was quickly contained due to joint efforts by the government, the WHO and other partners.

Ebola virus disease, which most commonly affects people and nonhuman primates (monkeys, gorillas and chimpanzees), is caused by one of five Ebola viruses. The virus is transmitted to people from wild animals and spreads in the human population through human-to-human transmission. The average case fatality rate is around 50%.
In the past five weeks, there have been 21 suspected cases, including 17 deaths.

Though, there is arrangement of controlling the deadly disease in the country.

The WHO's regional director for Africa, Dr. Matshidiso Moeti said; “we will gather more samples, conduct contact tracing, engage the communities with messages on prevention and control, and put in place methods for improving data collection and sharing".  "WHO will work closely with health authorities and partners to support the national response,"  Dr. Moeti said.